News Perspectives

2 Nurses Get Ebola; Response under Scrutiny

By Mary Pickett, M.D.

In a hearing October 16, members of Congress criticized mistakes that may have allowed Ebola to spread at a Dallas hospital. Nurses Nina Pham and Amber Joy Vinson were diagnosed this week. Both took care of Thomas Eric Duncan at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital. The Liberian man died last week. Pham checked herself into the hospital when she developed a fever. Vinson flew home to Dallas from Cleveland with a low-grade fever. Tests showed both had Ebola. Vinson was sent to a special unit at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta October 15. Pham was transferred the same day to a special National Institutes of Health unit in Maryland. In testimony before Congress, a hospital official apologized for mistakes made in Duncan's case.

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